I'm a massive fan of keffy, and there just aren't enough keffy fics out there for my liking, so i decided to entertain myself and write something keffy. i may just leave this as a one-shot, but if any further ideas come up i'll be posting them : )

One minute you're swirling in such pools of euphoria and liberation, that invincibility seems almost everyday, and the next moment the bondage of reality owns again; it carefully sits specs of mundane normalcy on the bridge of your nose, patting you on your head and telling you to be on your way until next time. A spiteful tease, in many ways, just like her. And it's haunting how this switch can just be flipped –how your switch can just flip. But this is what she does – so expertly – the way she's able to unravel all doubt and restraint with just a hint of one of her looks; you become a liability.

Never mind the fact that once you leave this room, this bed – her – your husband will cease to be an easily ignored entity shadowing in the background of your mind, and with the realization of just how real Kevin is (how real he's always been) comes all of your wifely duties. Did you carry out all of your wifely duties today? The answer to that is always yes, but just barely, and it's ironic that the answer's always yes because you're sure that letting her lure you into her bed is not what being his wife should entail. But, you'll tell yourself anything to tighten the noose around the neck of your relentless conscience.

"Going somewhere?" She croaks out into the scarcely lit room.

You stop trying to creep out of the bed like the guilty thief that you are, because lets face it, you meet up with her and you steal little shards of a fantasy that'll never be.

Still – on the edge of the bed – is how you sit, just managing to force a look in her direction.

"Kevin's waiting for me." You barely whisper; it's just a sub-vocal hiss.

But somehow her ears manage, they must, 'cause there goes that disparaging scoff that you've come to expect from her whenever one of your lust-driven nights reaches this point. It's always the same, always performed with a roll of the eyes and her signature all-knowing smug smirk. She doesn't even have to offer any words. The scoff is all that is needed to let you know you're being judged.

Well, she hasn't any right, not after what she did to you all those years ago.

"Fuck you Effy!" That isn't said in anything even close to a sub-vocal hiss, and Effy's not going to have to strain to hear this either: "You're the one who shat on everything, so don't try to make me feel like I'm the fuck-up here ok? I've got a husband now." Saying the last part feels like a nice glass of champagne after a stressful day at work. Every time you remind her feels like a nice glass of champagne after a stressful day at work.

It's monstrously abrupt, the way she pushes the back of her head off of the headboard to sit herself up. The bed whinges.

If Effy's angry, good.

"Katie," She laughs, almost manically. "I know you have a husband, America and Italy know you have a husband, the starving kids in Africa know you've got a husband. The only time you're not mentioning him is when you've got my cunt in your mouth! Interesting , that, isn't it?."

It's the most animation you've ever witnessed from Effy, more animated than when her fingers are wound in your hair and tugging when you've got your head between her thighs, more animated then when her starved-for-a-steady-rhythm of breath body octopuses around your naked form as she quivers in orgasm. Weird if you think about it; that all you have to do to elicit this level of passion in her is mention events from six years ago.

Always did push each other's buttons, perhaps a little harder than necessary.

Effy's hand shovels a heap of hair over to one side of her head, and it's like the motion has helped her to turn over a new leaf, as a slightly softer than previous tone flows from her lips. "I… shouldn't have messed you around back then…shouldn't have hit you in the head with a rock, but you also have to acknowledge that you shouldn't have cornered me in the woods that night!"

Stripped to the bare element, it's an apology, but there's something non-committal about it, and you know that there always will be until you fulfill Effy's desire to hear that she wasn't the only one at fault that night.

Still, you're not going to admit that you shouldn't have cornered her in the woods that night, because you don't believe that. Far as you're concerned, you were perfectly within your rights. She made it so that you had no other choice, goading you at every opportunity with surreptitious eye-sex, only to lean up into Freddie's lips, sending jealousy of dual purpose spiraling throughout each of your veins. You wanted to know what she was playing at, so you were perfectly within your rights to follow her deep into the wood's rustling twisted claws, and send her crashing to the dirt – whether she was tripping on shrooms or not. You were perfectly justified in mounting her, brutally marking her cheeks and neck with your handprints, because she was fucking with you, and nobody fucks with Katie Fitch. She made you corner her. She made it so that you had to show her who she was messing with. Katie fucking Fitch!

It's Katie Fitch: Head bitch in charge, not Effy Stonem: head bitch in charge.

That's the way it used to be anyway.

You're not going to acknowledge that you shouldn't have cornered Effy in the woods that night, although you wished you hadn't, because if you hadn't, the skin just next to your temple wouldn't lump under your fingers when you part your hair to style it in the morning, and you'd still be living life under the credo of I'm Katie Fitch, nothing can touch me. Effy didn't just break your skin open with that rock, she broke much more than that, and if she thinks that she's just going to waltz back into your life and have you at the click of her fingers, then she's even more of a cunt than you remember.

Fucking her is one thing. Loving her willingly is another. It's a spiteful tease, just like her.

You've now abandoned the bed, abandoned her, top around your neck as you throw your arms into it, "Whatever Effy. You always deliberately wound me up, flirting with everyone and anyone – even Naomi. You fucking wanted me to attack you in the woods, to choke you! That's how fucked up you were – are!"

There goes that other scoff of hers, the one that clues you in as to just how off the mark you really are, and you're certain that if she scoffs once more tonight you will kill her – literally open her up and watch her DNA fill the cracks in the laminate floorboards.

"Had nothing to do with me being fucked up." She corrects you, because it's, like, just fucking impossible that she could be wrong on the matter, just fucking impossible that you could be right. "…We were too alike, too different, and you were more homophobic than Shirley Phelps herself. That wound me up Katie. Knowing that all you'd ever give me was sex and nothing else, because you couldn't stop hating your lust for me enough to ever consider loving me, is what wound me up. I resented you and I just wasn't good at hiding it."

Even as venom slightly slickens her sentence, this is a reminder of how much Effy must've changed; the very fact that she's said more than two words to you throughout the two months that you've been meeting up for this – whatever this is – the very fact that there's sentiment to those words, the very fact that you can actually decode what the hell she's talking about with relative ease. But, she still looks the same, still gives those cryptic glances from time to time without putting forth any words to clear up the haze that they create in your head. Still has those big beautiful fucking blue eyes, that mane of fashionably mussed hair, and despite the changes, every same is a screwdriver with a bolt on the end of it jammed into your jaw, twisting on encore. You can't get past the jowl ache – won't.

"Yeah, well, this isn't happening again." You inform her, and once having pulled on your jeans add, "Just leave me alone from now on, yeah?"

"You know, you're not nearly as pretty when you're deluding yourself Katie."

She still has that arrogance, which in its silence is ridiculously loud. It's the worst kind, much worse than the arrogance you used to emit in college; she doesn't even have to work at it. And the most soul-clenching part about it is that her self-certainty is completely justified, because she's always been able to penetrate past your farces, and hate is much too merry a word to describe how you feel about that.

It's probably futile, but feeling the need to defend how bare you feel, you spit, "Fuck off! The only one who's deluding themselves here is you!" A sigh comes naturally from within – perhaps your body's way of cleansing your muscles of the emotions tightening them. "You're not God's gift. Just because you had those dickheads Cook, JJ, and Freddie fawning over you in college –"

"Don't forget to include yourself amongst that list Katie." These fourteen syllables and nine words is all it takes from her to shred the defenses that you were just having some success in building, and you feel as exposed as ever – recompense for even trying to cover up in the first place.

There's no retort floating on the surface of your lips for that, which is a rarity for you, so you make do with: "Like I said, leave me alone from now on. Have we got that?"

There's no answer, no nod. Nothing. And the silence is cue for a hasty departure.

Although no response had followed last night's instruction – demand rather – Effy seems to be complying. She seems to've understood. She hasn't text you her usual taunting, 'see you next week,' and for once you don't feel haunted by her. Thoughts of her soft hands escapading your skin don't follow you into the shower either (for once), like they usually do, even though they know how unwelcome they are, and breakfast isn't filled with conjecture as to what she might be doing with her day. It isn't.

It feels like it's over.

So It's a jarring experience when you drop by Emily's and Naomi's flat to find her sat in their lounge, a glass swimming with what looks like whisky poised in her hand, the two of them giggling, apparently, at something they've just seen on the television . She hasn't seen you yet, neither of them have, but from your position in the doorway, you only see her. Never mind the bright yellow of Naomi's casual t-shirt, because the browns, blacks, and navy blues that comprise Effy's appearance are a million times louder, to you, anyway.

So loud it hurts, and when the cacophony becomes too much, you react in the only way you know, the only way she deserves. "What the fuck's she doing here?" The bag on your shoulder purposely thumps the vacant settee, over by the window, when it gets tossed out of pure disgust.

That more than gets their attention. It snatches their giggles and gives Naomi the expression that comes with having just consumed Marmite. Naomi hates Marmite. As for Effy, well, who knew what her face meant?

"Katie, look," Naomi starts with a conspicuous sigh, but you're voice tramples all over hers.

"Does Emily know that you spend your days with the fucktard who tried to kill me, whilst she goes out to put food on your table Naomi?"

Effy's eyes are searing on your skin as you deliberately focus that perfected Katie Fitch glare at Emily's traitor of a girlfriend, and they're searing because you can feel the thick accusation of hypocrisy that they're almost stabbing you with.

But so what? So what if you've been meeting Effy, one night a week, for sex over the last two months? So what if it's somewhat hypocritical of you to now be chewing into Naomi for spending time with the rock-happy brunette? Like, so fucking what? It's you that has to live out the rest of your days with a fucking tattoo of what happened that night blemishing the flesh that neighbors your temple. And on an off day, you're the one who has to talk your anxieties into acquiescence before the idea of leaving the house becomes a friendly one. It's your place to say when – if – Effy will ever be granted forgiveness, not Naomi's.

"Look, I'll go." Effy looks to Naomi, smiling weak and brief, before slowly making it to her feet, almost as if wary that any sudden movement will drive your palpable anger into something even more sinister. Perceptive as ever, she's right.

As difficult as it is to remember the last time that you and Effy agreed on something, it doesn't matter, because you've never been more in assent than you are now. "Yeah, just fuck off!" You bark, as she sits her glass of wine down on the coffee table and slips into her brown leather jacket.

Naomi quickly jumps up, "No Eff, You don't have to go. Stay." She sets a preventative hand on Effy's shoulder, whilst shooting you a glare that's almost as acrimonious as yours. Not quite though. The disdain in her eyes is manufactured. It doesn't come from within – an accumulative of anguished life experiences – like yours does, and hers visibly lacks bite because of it.

Effy glances your way, and for a second you think that she's silently asking for your permission to drop out of her jacket and resume her spot on the settee, but it soon becomes apparent that she's not. Her head is slowly shaking from side to side, and there's a small, yet vastly irritating, smirk playing on the same lips, which last night, were responsible for briefly muting your reluctance to forgive her. Then it becomes clear: she's not asking you for anything. She's just traded in her scoff for this side to side head motion and smirk, but the mockery is still there, in all of its presence, and so is that air of, 'I know something that you don't.'

The unspoken goading – at least that's the way you've interpreted it – fast eats away at you, eats away at all awareness of the blonde haired, blue eyed, third person in the room, and out slips an enraged, "I told you last night to fucking leave me alone from now on! What part of that are you finding difficult Stonem?"

Silence washes over the room and your palm flies to your betraying lips. But the words have long escaped, and to all eyes in the room, throwing your palm over your mouth has probably just incriminated you even further.

Cautiously peering over at Naomi, it's easy to hear the question marks dancing around her head, bumping into each other and deliberating, before they cease and culminate in the blonde's: "From now on?" Her sight flickers enquiringly between the two of you.

The way you look at Effy and the way she looks at you is responsible for the partially confused blonde's next question. "H-have you two been… seeing each other… or something?"

Easily, it could've been a confused frown warping Naomi's features, but the ridiculousness of what she's just asked has sent that frown the other way, resulting in an incredulous chuckle.

Effy remains silent, remains in power by leaving the task of answering Naomi's question to you, and how you abhor her for it. How you've always abhorred her for it.

She was the same back in college; seldom opening her mouth, but when she did, something thought provoking always came out, and when you'd try to embark with her on those thoughts that she'd caused you to give birth to…silence. She would even provoke thought with her silence, using her azure pools to say what needed to be said. It made her intriguing. She was the last page of an intoxicating book, with which you had to keeping checking for a sequel. There never was a sequel though, just more intoxicating books, which forced your intrigue into constantly checking for sequels. The power was always hers, was always in her silence.

Bitch!

Somehow Naomi's crushing expectation of an answer melts for the moment, flooding images of the night you found yourself naked and underneath Effy Stonem for the first time, bodies writhing together in a blur of perspiration, labored pants, soft skin and familiar yet foreign scents, filling your senses. She'd taken your power then too, just as she was doing now, had hardly said anything, had ignored Freddie and Cook's embarrassing attempts to win her attention, had gazed at you all night, , had prompted you to frown and finally ask, 'What?'

You'd been quiet to the best of your ability (because Katie Fitch and silent was never a relationship that was going to work) that night too, thought you'd give Elizabeth a taste of her own fucking medicine, because ever since college had commenced you'd been in her ear, painting a picture of just how fierce everything could be if she'd just combine forces with you to run Roundview. But the raven-haired girl never took the bait, though saying that, the raven-haired girl also seemed to take deliberate care not to shatter your vision. She simply ceased to respond, and eventually, being ignored by her became excruciatingly unbearable. So you'd show her, let her know who she was dealing with. Katie fucking Fitch waits for nobody, and for once, buzzing around Effy hadn't been at the top of your list of priorities. Everyone else in attendance that night had enjoyed conversation from you, and you from them, then there was Effy, stood staring at you – through you – it'd become impossible to tell after an hour or two.

'What?' You'd finally asked her, with an irritated frown.

She'd remained ever so powerfully silent, just smirked, knowingly, and everything seemed to belong to her again. Everything. Even you.

Powerless.

"Nice surprise to see you here Katie, considering…." Enter Emily, slinging her work bag on the settee next to yours, although the cheer in her hazel's quickly dim when she attunes to the precarious mood lingering. Then she spots Effy, and whatever's left of the cheer in her eyes dwindles to nothing, dwindles into minus numbers, all the way into anger. "What's going on?"

"I was just leaving." You announce, hands, belonging to the wealth of discomfort in the room, pushing you towards the front door, and just before scarlet sunlight is kissing your face, your ears pick up on the torrent of inquisition that your twin begins bombarding her girlfriend with. Nothing else is heard once you slam the door in and work your legs down each step, the process of air filling and leaving your lungs becoming a less stagnated one the further you make it away from her. She's poison, you finalize.

Now safe in the alleyway next to Emily and Naomi's flat, it's all you can do to stop what's just happened from haunting you. All you can do to stop her haunting you. But it's as futile as a hand covering a bomb that's about to go off. Effy is there – here – there when Kevin's fuzzy chest is tickling the side of your face whenever you snuggle in bed, there when the mirror reflects you thumbing the scar she gave you, there in those times when you're so fucking worked up, thinking about her, that your feet stutter on the way to the office restroom, so that you can pinch at the coral of your goose-pimpled nipples and roll your slippery clit around in your fingers in the confines of one of the cubicles. And now Naomi might know thanks to the wafer thin performance you just gave in there.

"Sorry Katie."

You know that voice; you'd know it anywhere, because only she says your name in that way. It soothes and alarms you simultaneously, and it's unbearable to have such conflicts going on within – a tug of war between you and you. Yet somehow, when she walks those mud-blasted, Effyesque, boots towards you, gently slips both her hands around your drained cheeks and leaps for your lips, pulling on them with her own, all alarm silences.

Everything slips into nothingness, like that state between sleep and consciousness.

Poison, you constantly roll around your head.

Poi-son

Poi…